Marriage is a feast where the grace is sometimes better than the dinner.

It is a curious paradox that precisely in proportion to our own intellectual weakness will be our credulity, to those mysterious powers assumed by others; and in those regions of darkness and ignorance where man cannot effect even those things that are within the power of man, there we shall ever find that a blind belief in feats that are far beyond those powers has taken the deepest root in the minds of the deceived, and produced the richest harvest to the knavery of the deceiver.

It has been observed that a dwarf standing on the shoulders of a giant will see farther than the giant himself; and the moderns, standing as they do on the vantage ground of former discoveries and uniting all the fruits of the experience of their forefathers, with their own actual observation, may be admitted to enjoy a more enlarged and comprehensive view of things than the ancients themselves.

Anguish of mind has driven thousands to suicide; anguish of body, none. This proves that the health of the mind is of far more consequence to our happiness than the health of the body, although both are deserving of much more attention than either of them receive.

Taking things not as they ought to be, but as they are, I fear it must be allowed that Macchiavelli will always have more disciples than Jesus.

To know a man, observe how he wins his object, rather than how he loses it; for when we fail, our pride supports us - when we succeed, it betrays us.

God is on the side of virtue; for whoever dreads punishment suffers it, and whoever deserves it, dreads it .